STORRS — All-American Katie Lou Samuelson is expected to return to the court for the UConn women’s basketball team’s much-anticipated showdown with rival Notre Dame on Sunday, but there’s still no definitive timetable for when sophomore forward Batouly Camara will make her season debut.

Samuelson suffered a sprain in her left foot in the first half of a Nov. 17 win over California. She is still the Huskies’ leading scorer with an average of 16.5 points per game even though she missed the entire second half of one of the two games she appeared in. She has missed the last four games, including all three on a recent road trip, but returned to practice on Friday. She still has to make it through Saturday’s practice and Sunday’s shootaround, but all signs point toward Samuelson being in the lineup.

“She’s only played 11/2 games, she is a little bit rusty,” UConn coach Geno Auriemma said after Friday’s practice. “We have one more practice (Saturday) and we’ll see how that goes, and we have shootaround and see how that goes. She is expecting to play, I am expecting her to play so barring anything unforeseen, that is the plan.”

Samuelson had her foot re-examined on Thursday and was given the OK the return to practice.

“I am ready to play,” Samuelson said. “We’ll see how tomorrow goes before we make that decision, but I hope that I can get that opportunity.”

Azurá Stevens has started the last four games in place of Samuelson. She is averaging 14.2 points and a team-high 9.5 rebounds per game.

Auriemma said that Camara isn’t that close to returning. It looks unlikely that she’ll be back for Sunday’s Jimmy V Classic game or the Dec. 8 game at DePaul, but with a week and a half break before the next game, Camara could make her UConn debut against Oklahoma on Dec. 19.

“This is probably her third practice. She hasn’t been able to go full and look like her old self so we’ll see when that happens,” Auriemma said. “For now, I don’t anticipate it (Camara playing on Sunday), but you never know. I guess everything is day to day.”

Camara, a transfer from Kentucky, suffered a knee injury in the preseason and has yet to play in a game this season.

The injury bug isn’t limited to UConn.

Third-ranked Notre Dame has played without star post player Brianna Turner as well as Mychal Johnson all season. Kathryn Westbeld is not at 100 percent, and on Tuesday, freshman forward Mikayla Vaughn suffered a season-ending knee injury, leaving the Fighting Irish without the 8 points and 4.3 rebounds she has been contributing off the bench.

“I feel terrible for kids,” Auriemma said. “Mikalyla on their team is probably heartbroken as anybody would be, it is just unfortunate. It is not easy, you try to do the best you can to help kids, but at the same time, we certainly had our share and had to deal with it. No matter how many times you have to go through it, it is never easy.”

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UConn is playing in the Jimmy V Classic for the seventh season in a row and this is the third time in the last four years that the Huskies and Fighting Irish will play in the event. The game, being played at the XL Center in Hartford, is approaching sellout status with more than 14,000 tickets already distributed.